Unspeakable Alliance
by Andreas K N
Summary: Harry decides run from trouble rather than into it, for once. But on the Knight Bus, he gets it all backwards, again. And with him of all people. Featuring fist fights, sausages, and runaway window-panes. (hd slash)


**NOTE:** This is an illustrated fic, and since images can't be included here, I'd advice you to check out this version instead: 

http://www.livejournal.com/users/kayen/65083.html

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_O lady, you in whom my hope gains strength, you who, for my salvation,_  
_have__ allowed your footsteps to be left in Hell_  
- Dante, _Paradiso_

**Unspeakable Alliance**  
by Andreas

**Chapter 1: Knight Fuss**

Residing in Hell has one obvious benefit: You're quite unlikely to get yourself killed. One might also argue that it'd be hard for you to sink any lower, or be pushed further down. But as long-standing tradition has it, there are levels in the Underworld, so it hardly seems a safe bet unless you're perched on Satan's left eyeball. And even then, you run the risk of getting well and truly buggered, or being used as an amusing implement in a large-scale realisation of said sodomy. Either that or you slip up and get picked on by Odysseus the Optician of Doom.

In short, the relative safety of Hell was well and truly overrated, as was that of No 4, Privet Drive, in Harry Potter's hellishly overheated opinion. So what if Dumbledore thought Harry was safe with the Dursleys? He'd much prefer Beelzebub's slippery eyeball to Dudley's piggy little eyes, piercing him with spite on a daily basis. And Vernon Dursley was a narrow-minded, inverted Cyclops if ever there was one, seeing only one side to reality and never blaming Nobody but always Harry for any and all misfortunes.

No, Harry had to get out. You just couldn't _live_ in Hell. Even Dumbledore should've been able to spot that paradox. Besides, there was no heavenly Beatrice beyond Dursley purgatory. Cho Chang had lost her alluring lustre, and there had been no one to replace her. No, might as well turn and bolt in the opposite direction. Only sensible thing to do. Let someone else be the bloody hero for once. If the prophecy held true – and he had no great belief in the talents of Professor Trelawney – trouble would find him whichever way he was headed, so he might as well get a head start this time. It was – most definitely – time to leave.

He had no specific destination in mind – unless the future really was a foreign country, because Harry wanted one. Future, that is, not a foreign country. In fact, the former often seemed denied him by his being appointed protector of the latter, for however much Harry tried to blend in, he would forever be a stranger in a strange land, the boy raised in the Muggle wilderness. And unlike Muggleborns, Harry had a ready-made role to fill in the Wizarding world, a Boy-Who-Lived bubble to inhabit, shaped by myths, hopes, and expectations, never allowing him direct contact with the world beyond the bubble.

Few people seemed willing to burst that bubble, and those who did were rarely fit for the task. Professor Snape was too repulsively greasy to get anywhere near Harry's bubble, and Dudley was entirely too spherical to achieve sharp enough pressure. No, bursting Harry's bubble would require someone more _pointed_. But Harry _refused_ to be in any way popped by Draco bloody Malfoy, poncy little bugger that he was. He'd have to _escape_, away from adoring fans, away from mad enemies, away from his bubble, and away from the sniggering voice at the back of his head.

Listening for heavy feet creaking down the stairs – transporting a humanoid hippopotamus to a perfectly superfluous nightly feed – distracted Harry from the sniggering, but the empty blackness of his room enhanced the streetlighted silver screen of his ceiling. And shutting his eyes only brought the dreams and fantasies closer, pressing against a mind fighting sleep, assaulted on both sides by unwelcome images, fucked-up fancies and realistic nightmares. But this night, Harry had more reason than usual to stay awake, and much to keep his mind off phallic fantasies of pureblood sausages-inna-bun. He was going away, tonight. Preferably someplace with no sausages whatsoever.

So, Harry listened, and listened, and listened. And when he finally found himself at the foot of the stairs, suitcase by his feet, Dudley stood before him, goggling, with a sausage in his dumpy right hand. And Harry hated him for it. Not for being there, in front of him, blocking his path – for that was part of Harry's Cunning Plan – but for not having the common decency to stay out of Harry's twisted fantasies. On the other hand, the repulsion rattling through Harry's body would only serve to make this all the more gratifying. And perhaps it would put him off sausages, permanently.

'What're you doin'?' asked Dudley, sausage quivering in confusion.

'Leaving,' said Harry, glowering and keeping his eyes well off the trembling sausage.

Dudley blinked. The sausage stilled, as did the whole blob of a boy. 'Wha—? Are you goin' t'some bloody fancy-schmancy-dress party?'

'No,' said Harry, who had decided to go for all-out rebellion when he was at it, dressed all in dark grey, one of Dudley's old sweaters cut open at the top to reveal more pale skin than Aunt Petunia would have ever allowed, and a small necklace with shark teeth too. His trousers, bought at the same store as the necklace for money he'd earned doing odd jobs below Dursley radar, were tight and low-riding, and very much Not Dudley's. But the most stunning change of all, holding Dudley's goggling eyes in a vicelike grip, were the markings on Harry's face.

With a black marker, eyeliner, and a stolen blusher, Harry had drawn claw-like patterns around his eyes and across his cheeks, enhancing the effect with eyeliner and maroon blush. In combination with generous helpings of gel in his already unruly hair and a special design incorporating his trademark scar, it effectively blotted out all trace of the Boy Who Lived, the hopelessly mainstream little hero. It was the perfect disguise, calling attention to itself rather than the person beneath. And it unsettled Dudley, who already thought Harry more than a bit queer. Besides, with a long night awake (he'd not dared to use an alarm) awaiting his corpulent cue, Harry had been bored. A bit too bored, perhaps. But at least it wasn't a tattoo. At least it wasn't _sausages_.

'Da's no'going to le'you prance roun' like tha', you little poofter,' smirked Dudley, and the sausage soared towards his widening mouth. This, Harry decided, was a time for quick and decisive action.

'Get out of my way.'

That stopped the sausage express. 'Wha—?'

'Get out. Of my. Way.'

Dudley laughed, rather like a pig with asthma. 'I don' think so!'

'I don't expect you to think. Just move.'

Dudley positioned himself firmly, and widely, in Harry's path. He was bigger than Harry in every sense, and confident in his abilities. 'You're not allowed to use magic! Wha're you goin' t'do? Huh?' So smug. So stupid.

Harry pulled up the hem of his sweater, revealing a stomach entirely too flat and skinny for Dudley to fathom. And there were words, in felt pen. 'BUGGER,' it said, 'OFF!' With a happy little trail beneath. And maybe Dudley wasn't as straight as he liked to imagine, or maybe it was just the effort of spelling out the words, but his eyes locked on the message, and the knee to his groin caught him completely by surprise. And while his eyes crossed into two elongated navels, the fist to his jaw did too.

The crash of Dudley's considerable bulk falling to the floor brought a verbal echo of surprised outrage from upstairs. Harry hurried across minor Mount Dursley, eliciting the full repertoire of a small slaughterhouse. He had no wish to try his magic on Dursley Sr. For it _was_ magic, of a sort. He had found it, not in Diagon Alley, but in a dingy little restaurant always in need of extra waiters. The fifth time he'd got his arse pinched by some lecherous old bugger, he'd known he was on to something, a power outside Ministry rule. And when he'd put aside magic to be able to escape the Wizarding eye of Big Brother, he'd decided to exploit the magic of sex appeal. And perhaps the words around his navel had been more for his benefit than Dudley's, because he didn't quite want to imagine that it could have worked without them. Not on Dudley. Not with that sausage.

Heading for the front door, Harry stopped to stomp on the runaway sausage. It burst at one end and squirted its content across the carpet, and Harry decided he was positively cursed. And cursed he most certainly was by Vernon Dursley, now thundering down the stairs. Aunt Petunia added her shrill scream to the cacophony as Harry shut the door behind him, put his ready-made doorstop in place, and set off into the night, in search of the Knight Bus.

Now, using the communal transport of the world you're trying to escape may not seem the most obvious course of action, and Harry had at first considered Muggle modes of travel. But the Knight Bus would take him further faster, and he needed to get to a crowded city before anyone caught on to his plans, be they friend or foe.

Besides, the very fact that he was using a magical means of transportation, in full view of other Wizarding folk, would hopefully conceal his real intentions. It would be assumed he was escaping his nasty Muggle relatives, at least by anyone who knew him well enough to question him. He would appear to be running _to_ the Wizarding world, not from it. Because he had quite a habit of running towards danger rather than, like any sensible person, running _from_ it. But now, Harry had finally got his prepositions sorted. Something which sadly did not seem to apply to Stan Shunpike of the newly flagged-down Knight Bus.

'Now, where d'you gerroff gettin' on in tha' kinda get-up?' he admonished as he hauled Harry's luggage into the aggressively stationary bus. 'Scare folks 'alf t'death, you will!'

A tall, middle-aged wizard with wavy brown hair and an overwhelming penchant for black clothing raised a thin eyebrow at Stan and put down the book he'd been reading. 'But of course,' he drawled, 'it _is_ dreadful. People will think we're under attack from the Minor Death Munchers and their Excessive Eyeliner of Doom, won't they? Oh, the dreadful dreaded dread of it all. How will we ever manage?' And then he returned his attention to the suitably black book before him.

Suddenly, Harry didn't feel quite so cool anymore. But he was grateful for the excessive amounts of blusher that went with the eyeliner because, in the dimly lit bus, no one would notice its shifting hue.

'No need t'be rude,' muttered Stan, leading Harry further down the crowded bus. 'And we're completely swamped too. Keep changing destinations, they do. Not a bloody 'otel, y'know.' He stopped, turned to Harry, and indicated a double bed at the back of the bus. 'You'll 'ave to share. But it's 'alf rate!' He grinned, as if getting reduced fare on the Knight Bus was perfectly on a par with winning the lottery. Though, considering the way the Bus tended to rattle around, it was probably more in the way of a free tour of a spinning tombola.

Harry handed Stan six sickles, peering past him at the bed. Being several paces away and poorly lit, the figure sprawled across its wide surface was nothing but boots, black trousers, light blue shirt, and ruffled blond hair to Harry's eyes. 'Does that include half the bed too?' he enquired, indicating the faceless bed hogger.

Stan turned and shouted, in a voice that left no doubt as to his attitude to this particular passenger, 'Oi! Malfoy! Make room, you cheap bastard!'

Oh no, thought Harry. _No way!_

Stan shook his head at Harry. 'Rich git refused t'pay full fare for that there bed. 'Twas the only one left, bu' is no' like he can' afford it, right?' he said, missing the curiously Muggle finger the otherwise immobile Malfoy extended his way. 'Sorry, mate. Best I can do. So, where you goin' then?'

'Manchester,' said Harry, picking one possible destination more or less at random, still staring in horror at the hideousness extending its tentacles of terror onto _his_ side of the bed. All in all, he was in rather a troubled state of mind, verging on cerebral civil war. If someone had come up to him offering a selection of sausages, murder would have ensued, or a girlish shriek followed by a broken window. It was hard to tell.

Stan stared at Harry as though he could read the latter's troubled mind, possibly finding little worth reading in his own. It was quite unnerving.

'What?' asked Harry, resisting the urge to make a snappish remark about mind reading and empty mental libraries.

'Tha's where 'e come from,' said Stan, indicating Malfoy. He grinned. 'So, should be a nicer place now, ey?'

Stan was still chuckling as he joined Ernie in the front, telling him to take 'er away. And away they went, with a bang and a jolt that made Harry stagger up to Malfoy's bed, to _his_ bed, to _their_ bed. Though he'd rather ignore the joint possessive. But certainly not the second, _his_. His first reaction had been to sulk in a corner far away from Malfoy, but pride beat prejudice hands down – pride of possession; _his_ bed. He'd paid good money for it. Half price; Malfoy nearly expired, by the looks of it.

There was another bang. Harry fell forward. 'Oof!' said the pureblooded blemish on an otherwise perfectly comfortable bed. Harry rolled to the less Malfoy-infested side of the bed and shoved at the other boy.

'Move!'

Malfoy turned his head, stared blearily at Harry, blinked, and blinked again. '_Potter?_ What the hell – are you doing here?' he mumbled, still blinking in befuddlement.

'I could ask you the same. Didn't think the Knight Bus was quite up to Malfoy standards. Picks up any riff-raff, doesn't it?' said Harry, raising an eyebrow to show exactly what present riff-raff he was referring to.

'Well,' drawled Malfoy, trying to coordinate his own eyebrows, 'I'm cur'ntly a bit maghichally indispissed – -posed – indisponced, Pehotty. So, piff off.'

'You're drunk,' said Harry, with some considerable relish.

'I'm hichnebriated,' slurred Malfoy. 'On hexpensisive beheverages.' He frowned. 'And what the hich have you done t'your face, ninnyway?'

'None of your damn business,' growled Harry, turning his attention to the swaying chandelier in the middle of the bus. Malfoy moaned pitifully beside him.

'Bugger.'

'What?' snapped Harry, wishing the drunk would just die already.

'I'm too nibbriated t'kill you, you otter bastard,' whined Malfoy.

'You couldn't kill a dead otter, Malfoy. Much less the Bastard Who Lived,' said Harry, knowing just how much his unasked-for fame annoyed the other boy.

'Oh, biff off, Bother,' huffed Malfoy and shoved Harry off the bed.

His bottom bruised and aching, Harry jumped back onto the bed and, determined to take the mature approach, got even by rolling Malfoy face first onto the floor. This proved a very bad move. No longer held in place by the warm clutches of a comfortable bed, Malfoy saw no reason not to attempt grievous bodily harm, even if he was too nibbriated to use his wand.

'You put my farter in pissin!' howled the incoherent ball of rage hurling himself headlong at Harry. And Harry would have laughed had not his jaw been otherwise occupied, connecting intimately with Malfoy's bony fist, sending tentacles of pain shooting up his skull and his body flying sideways into the aisle. His shoulder slammed into the leg of another bed. 'Well, _really_!' exclaimed an unseen female while Malfoy aimed a fierce kick at Harry's left leg.

There was another bang and another jolt, and Malfoy fell forward to find his face meeting Harry's elbow in quite an unpleasant sort of way. Clutching his bruised cheek, he rolled off Harry, moaning in agony.

In the front of the bus, Stan was on his feet and heading towards the fight, shouting 'Oi! None of that 'ere!' repeatedly before he tripped over the outstretched leg of the black-clad wizard.

Harry staggered to his feet, gripping the surrounding beds for support, head spinning. Malfoy hooked his leg around Harry's as he rose, and Harry folded painfully across a brass footboard.

'In prissyson!' shrieked Malfoy, fingers digging into Harry's scalp as he pulled him away from the feet of one very distraught elderly witch.

Harry jabbed his elbow into Malfoy's stomach and, turning around, rammed his fist into it as well. Two stomach blows for the price of one; an excellent deal! Malfoy's belly was flat and soft through the silky fabric of his shirt. And mental sniggers made Harry see red.

While Harry tumbled through this troubled state of mind, Malfoy hurtled backwards through the bus, aided by yet another bang and crumpling at the feet of the black-clad wizard. 'Here,' said the man, grabbing Malfoy's shoulder and pushing a flask between his lips. Malfoy offered feeble resistance. The liquid surged down his throat. His body shook as though he'd been poisoned, but when his limbs stilled, both his body and mind were curiously clear, purged of hexpensisive beverages. Expensive, even.

'You ruined my family!' roared Malfoy, charging towards Harry, high on instant sobriety.

As Harry toppled backwards over the corner of a migrating bed, Stan's protesting face met with the inhospitable surface of a heavy black book, and he too toppled. But he didn't get up anywhere near as quickly as Harry, on his feet and in Malfoy's face in a mere matter of seconds.

'Your father helped _destroy_ my family! I HAVE NO ONE LEFT!'

Malfoy smirked. 'Now, whatever _would_ those overprotective little Weasels say about that, you ungrateful little brat,' he spit out before his face crashed into a nearby window and his spit smeared across the glass, leaving a pinkish trail.

A sharp swerve separated the two combatants, and suddenly Malfoy had his wand out, fire in his eyes and unslurred words on his lips. But before he'd made it halfway through the hex, his wand soared into the waiting hand of the black-clad wizard, and Harry's fist soared towards his face. Malfoy bounced against the window with a heavy thump and clawed at Harry as he fell.

This proved the last straw for Harry's already cut-up sweater. Unhemmed and old, it tore open and slid past Harry's shoulders, bunching around his waist, trapping his arms. Malfoy pulled at Harry's legs, sending him crashing onto a recently vacated bed.

As a sweaty and flushed Malfoy lunged at a writhing Harry, a bearded old wizard sitting on the bed opposite asked, 'Is this some new onboard entertainment then?'

'No,' wheezed Stan, earning himself another booking.

'Pity,' said the wizard, and smiled as Harry kneed Malfoy and the latter, quite involuntarily, rubbed his chest against the Harry's. Suffice to say, not all were quite as pleased. Least of all Harry. He might have had his arms stuck in a sweater determined to prove durable after its recent mishap, but he could still kick and bite, and use his shoulders to great effect. And Malfoy pounded and clawed and kicked, and found his hands on Harry's exposed skin far too often.

They rolled across the floor, bounced from side to side, tumbled over beds, and howled obscenities. Ernie drove on out of habit and pure bafflement. Stan crawled feebly across the floor. And anyone who'd thought to intervene was immediately discouraged by the steely gaze of the black-clad wizard, and the ebony wand he so absently toyed with.

The fight escalated, and Ernie's driving became increasingly erratic. 'Ernie!' shouted Stan, staggering towards the imagined safety of his armchair. 'Stop the bus!'

And just as Harry charged, head first, towards mother-insulting Malfoy, the Knight Bus screeched to a halt. Not one of its stylish, if abrupt, on-a-penny stops but a sideways skid across smoking asphalt.

Bus and head-butting sent Malfoy soaring backwards with Harry in tow, towards a window that quickly decided to take its chances in the blackness beyond rather than try to stop this cannonball of combined rage and kinetic energy.

They hit grass-clad dirt and rolled once, twice. Below Harry, Malfoy moaned, inspiring mental sniggers and a quick roll to the side. Outlined against the light of the bus, Stan stood, framed by the glass-less window.

'You broke my bloody window!'

'Actually,' said Harry, glancing into the darkness, 'I think it … ran off.'

Stan was not in the mood. 'I don' know what yer problem with Malfoy is, y'freak, but I won' be havin' you mess up my buss! You can find yer own way t'Manchester!'

'I think I'm dying,' said Malfoy.

'Oh, shut up,' said Harry, too tired and tied-up to do anything but glare.

Three seconds later, a substantial pile of luggage, Harry's solitary suitcase among it, thumped down on a decidedly not amused Draco Malfoy. There was a bang, and then they were alone.

'Guh,' said Malfoy. Harry ignored him, devoting his full attention to wriggling out of his shapeless sweater.

'I'm being crushed!'

Harry glanced at the pile as he rose. 'You shouldn't pack so much, you poncy bugger.' And then he went to the side of the narrow road, gazing out across moonlit fields and sticking out his wand hand. No bus appeared, but it had been worth a try. He sighed. Malfoy moaned.

'I can't move!'

'You were pretty damn mobile a few minutes ago,' muttered Harry, grimacing as he rubbed his sore shoulder.

'Some _help_, Potter?'

'Push.'

'Prat.'

Harry peered at the fir-forest behind them. 'Where the hell are we?'

'Under a starry sky, as far as I can see,' muttered Malfoy, apparently determined not to lift one single sore finger. 'The ground is cold.'

'Thank you. That's very helpful,' said Harry, starting down the road.

'Hey! You can't leave me here!'

Silence. Footsteps.

'When I die, you'll go to Azkaban!'

When Harry returned five minutes later, Malfoy was still wearing a blanket of heavy luggage. Harry sat down on a large suitcase.

'Gherflg,' said Malfoy.

'Can't see any houses,' said Harry, ignoring the background whimpers. 'We'd better stay here till dawn so we don't head off into the wilderness. What? Well, _more_ wilderness. But you're free to go wherever you wish, of course. Hm? No. I'm not sitting on you. I'm sitting on a suitcase. But we could use some firewood.' He got up and wandered off. Malfoy amused himself with a colourful list of obscenities.

'You're pathetic,' said Harry as he returned, arranging the wood into a small fire and lighting it with a lighter from his own suitcase, conveniently placed at the top of the small mountain still resting on one very stubborn Malfoy.

'I'm mortally wounded. If I move, I might DIE!'

'Well, you can't spend the night like that,' said Harry, wondering why on Earth he cared.

'The night? The NIGHT? I don't want to spend the NIGHT!'

'Well, if you feel like wandering off, be my guest, or not.'

'Wander? WANDER? Malfoys don't wander! We Apparate!'

'You have no wand. Besides, you're not allowed.'

Malfoy snorted. 'Well, at least heal these bloody bruises! I think I've cracked a rib!'

'No.'

Malfoy scowled. 'How very petty of you, Potter.'

'No. I'm not using my wand. For anything.'

Malfoy frowned. 'Why on Earth not?'

'I don't want to be found,' said Harry, wondering why he spoke at all.

The expressions flitting across Malfoy's face were entirely to fast and muddled to be properly described. 'Why, Potter! Running away? How very _noble_ of you!'

'I'm trying,' said Harry, 'to be sensible, for once. Not that you'd have heard of the concept.'

Malfoy sniggered. 'How amusing! Harry Potter, trying to be Slytherin!'

'No, _sensible_.'

'Same thing.'

Harry scowled, rose from his crouch by the fire, and started to tear down Mount Luggage. When he was done, Malfoy remained immobile, glaring at him.

'It's too late now, innit, you nitwit! I'm wounded beyond repair! Beyond the repair _you_ won't offer, oh glorious fugitive! I'll just lie here and freeze to death and then you'll be consumed by terrible, terrible guilt you – you Gryffindor!'

'Oh, shut up. There must be some blankets _somewhere_ in that,' he gestured towards Malfoy's luggage, '_mountain_.'

'Big green suitcase. Extendable blanket.'

Harry considered refusing to get it, but decided a dead Malfoy was more trouble than a warm Malfoy, in the long run, probably. Possibly.

_Extendable_ proved a very apt description, Harry realised as he'd pulled out a considerable length of blanket from an inconspicuous piece of thick cloth. He offered one end of the blanket to Malfoy who raised bruised arm, went '_OwowowowowowOWOWOWOOOW__! I'm DYING!_' and dropped it again. Harry sighed and, not wanting his trek through treacherous Malfoy Luggage to have been in vain, stepped over to Malfoy's other side, bent down, and rolled the protesting boy onto the outstretched blanket.

'GAAAH!'

Harry rolled Malfoy over once more and, suffering from pains of his own, threw the end of the blanket over Malfoy, rose, and began to push at Malfoy as one would a mat, rolling him roughly into the blanket. Not appreciating the pushing and occasional kicks, Malfoy screamed, quite literally, bloody murder.

Soon, Malfoy was snugly wrapped in six layers of thick blanket, right side up, looking rather like a fat sausage, Harry thought, and kicked him again for good measure.

'Argh! You sadistic bastard! I'll get you for this!'

'So you say,' said Harry, walking over to the spread-out luggage.

'I'm going to crack my bloody neck here, you know,' said Malfoy at the end of a spirited recital of recycled curses. Five seconds later, a plump suitcase was shoved under his head.

'Better?' said Harry.

Malfoy glared, but said nothing.

When Harry had pulled together a nest of his own, Malfoy snored peacefully in his cocoon. Harry stood for a while pondering the spectacle: _Chrysalis prat_. But no beautiful butterfly could ever emerge from the nasty shell of Draco Malfoy. And certainly no heavenly Beatrice.

Harry shut off his hormonal mind and fell purposely asleep.


End file.
